Europe (8/15 to win the Ryder Cup) captain Colin Montgomerie has questioned the mental state of Tiger Woods ahead of the Ryder Cup against the USA (15/8 to win, 9/1 the tie), starting in October, and says the US PGA Championship is now ‘very important’ for the current world number one.

Woods has dropped out of the eight automatic places for the American team, and has intimated previously that he would not accept being a wildcard pick from American skipper Corey Pavin.

That leaves the 34-year-old with two tournaments to salvage his qualification, with this week’s Bridgestone Invitational followed by the final major of the year, the US PGA Championship, at Whistling Straits starting next week.

Depending on his performance at the Bridgestone, which is not looking good after a first-round four-over-par 74, Woods may head into the US PGA (for which he is the 7/1 favourite) without his number one ranking, and Montgomerie can see that Woods is clearly not playing as well as he can.

“He’s not mentally with it right now, that’s obvious. I hope he gets back to some form shortly,” Monty told Sky Sports News.

“He lost the world number one spot to Vijay Singh a while back and didn’t like that very much and got it back. This won’t please him at all.

“But more importantly right now for Tiger is thinking about the Ryder Cup, he’s not in the top eight of their qualifying.

“It doesn’t look like he’s going to be in the top eight after this event anyway and that makes the US PGA a very important event for him next week.

“Does Corey Pavin take a chance hoping Tiger’s form will change before the Ryder Cup? That’s up to him and not us.”

The Ryder Cup takes place at Celtic Manor from October 1-3, with the European team set to be confirmed after the Johnnie Walker Championship on August 29.